1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for manufacturing an organic electroluminescence (EL) display including organic EL elements and an organic EL display obtained by the manufacturing method.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, organic EL displays including organic EL elements as light-emitting elements are attracting attention as flat displays. The organic EL display is a self-luminous flat panel display that demands no backlight, and has an advantage that it can realize a display with a wide viewing angle, which is a characteristic of the self-luminous display. Furthermore, the organic EL display is advantageous over backlight-type displays (such as liquid crystal displays) in the power consumption because only the necessary pixels are turned to the light-emission state in the organic EL display. In addition, the organic EL display is considered to have sufficient response performance with respect to high-definition and high-speed video signals that are expected to be put into practical use in the future.
In a general organic EL display, a lower electrode serving as a positive electrode (anode) is formed over a substrate formed of e.g. a glass panel. On the lower electrode, an organic layer composed of a hole transport layer and a light-emitting layer is formed. On the organic layer, an upper electrode serving as a negative electrode (cathode) is formed. Based on this structure, an organic EL element is formed at each position at which the lower electrode, the organic layer, and the upper electrode overlap with each other. A light-emission area is formed by vertically and horizontally arranging these organic EL elements. In a peripheral area thereof, an electrode portion for connecting the respective organic EL elements to an external circuit or internal drive circuit is formed (refer to e.g. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-207217 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-139970).
For the general organic EL display having such a structure, as shown in FIG. 19 for example, an area 54 outside an effective area 53 (area composed of a light-emission area 51 and a peripheral area 52 thereof) on the substrate is removed (along the cut lines in FIG. 19) after the film deposition of the respective layers, so that the organic EL display is completed. In this case, the effective area 53 and the other area 54 are not electrically connected to each other in general.